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Hopes and Screams
Hopes and Screams is the first comic book in the ''Monster High'' comic series by Heather Nuhfer. It was released on July 01, 2014 after having been announced on June 08, 2013 and rescheduled from December 03, 2013. The book contains six comic stories of a little under twenty pages each and a "Behind the Screams" section. The comic stories are united by the theme of the Gory Gazette. Summary ;Hissy Fit At the start of the school year, Frankie volunteers to take over the duties of the editor-in-chief of the Gory Gazette, who wishes to remain unknown. If Frankie does her job well, she may become a permanent staff member. Her first task is to find new writers for the newspaper and so, knowing that Ghoulia, Draculaura, and Clawdeen already write for the Gory Gazette, Frankie texts Cleo to see if she can add her to the staff. Cleo has to decline, but she promises to throw a party when the next issue is out to celebrate Frankie's achievement. As she informs Ghoulia and Deuce of this, Deuce's snakes start to hiss at Cleo. The ensuing ruckus has Hackington send them both out of the classroom and to Bloodgood's office. In the hall, Cleo demands an explanation from Deuce, but he runs off. Worried that he might no longer be interested in her now that his hair dislikes her, especially with their anniversary coming up, Cleo follows him around. This way, she spots him talking with Frankie in the creepateria and accidentally petrifying her. Convinced Deuce is looking for a new girlfriend, Cleo follows Ghoulia's advice to send in a question to Draculaura's advice column, but accidentally does so under her own name. Luckily, Draculaura is not one to let potential miscommunication harm her friends and with Clawdeen's and Lagoona's help gets the petrified Frankie in a cart so they can go to Cleo's house and figure out what's going on. At the place, however, they only find Deuce, who is looking for Cleo as well. They tell him of the text Cleo sent in and Deuce promptly takes the cart with Frankie in search for Cleo so he can explain what happened. It's only due to a text from her that he manages to find her in the clawditorium. With Frankie returned to normal in the meantime, Deuce manages to tell his side of story convincingly: he was looking for an anniversary gift for Cleo and needed Frankie for advice. His snakes were acting up so he wouldn't accidentally spoil the surprise. And when he got the gift, a pair of beautiful earrings, he showed them to Frankie, who became petrified by his stare reflecting off of them. Cleo is amused and reveals she disappeared for a rush lesson flute playing so she could charm his snakes into liking her again. Not wanting to let that go to waste, Deuce sits down for an exclusive concert. ;Hot Couture With the help of Ghoulia and Heath, Clawdeen rounds up another recording for her Gory Gazette vlog Fashion Screams and Yawns. Abbey joins them and ends up talking about her preference for well-dressed men with Clawdeen. Heath resolves to be feautured as a Scream on Clawdeen's vlog to impress Abbey, but his first attempt does not go well. He goes to Howleen for insider advice on how to earn Clawdeen's fashion approval, which Howleen gladly gives in an attempt to show Clawdeen she's just as good as she is. The first few attempts end as disastrous as Heath's own attempt, though, and Heath considers going to Clawdeen directly for help instead. Howleen is not about to give up just yet and goes through Clawdeen's new fashion collection to put together the perfect look for Heath. The look isn't bad at all and Heath accidentally lets it slip he's doing this for Abbey. Highly embarrassed, Heath's temperate makes the clothes catch fire and due to a clumsy move, Clawdeen's entire collection is aflame a moment later. Trying to save the situation, Howleen splashes everything with her and Heath's drinks. As such, all the clothes end up half-burned and with various green splotches. Panicking, Howleen tells Heath to hide in a locker and wait for her return, disregarding his claustrophobia. She herself goes out to get rid of the clothes before Clawdeen is done fearleading, but bumps into Holt. Upon his question what she's carrying around, she claims it's Clawdeen's latest line: Hot Mess. Holt and everyone else within hearing distance believe her and make a grab for the clothes to wear at the pep rally in a moment. Realizing she can't keep her secret anymore, Howleen goes to confess to Clawdeen what she did. Clawdeen is initially angry that her hard work is ruined, but she accepts it was an accident and is even impressed that Howleen could make a hit out of her ruined work. Howleen is happy with how things turned out and sits down on the bleachers to enjoy the casketball game. Just at that moment, Heath bursts in, having been forgotten by Howleen and not able to stand the tiny space anymore. He tries to get Abbey's approval for his new look, but she merely thinks he joined the trend rather than created and started it. Knowing better, Clawdeen agrees to give credit where credit's due and marks Heath's outfit as a Scream on her next episode of Fashion Screams and Yawns. ;Stage Fright Draculaura has worked the entire night on a script for a normie soap opera for the Gory Gazette and as a result is late again for Home Ick. Kindergrubber warns her not to endanger her grade any more, but this does not stop her from handing out the script to her classmates while the teacher is not looking. Her classmates worry about her, offering to take over some of the work, but Draculaura insists she's fine. Nonetheless, she's caught off-guard when Kindergrubber announces they'll be making finger sandwiches and faints. She awakens later in the medical room with Clawd and Frankie at her side, who urge her to take better care of herself and inform her Kindergrubber gave her a C+ for the assignment. Overconfident, Draculaura rejects the advice and promises to ace the next assignment. The school nurse prescribes her an iron supplement for her to take with her meals. Draculaura gladly grabs for it, but as Jackson starts talking to her, she accidentally picks up the bottle of reverserum next to her iron supplement. Draculaura stays at school late that day to build the decor for her soap opera to be filmed tomorrow. As predicted by her friends, it is too much for her and she falls asleep on a couch for the entire night. She almost is late for Home Ick again, but manages to rush into the classroom in time. The assignment is to bake cookies and Draculaura starts right away, placing her medicine on the table to take when she gets to eat one of her own cookies. But overworked and tired as she is, she mistakes it for vanilla and adds it to her cookies. The rest of the process goes smoothly, but just as she gets her cookies out of the oven, she is called to get to the clawditorium immediately. Kindergrubber offers to judge her cookies first with her fellow students and send one of them after her with her grade again. Draculaura happily runs off, but her mood turns sour when she finds her decor in ruins because of its shoddy construction. Worse, almost all of her actors that slowly join her in the clawditorium suddenly refuse to get on stage. Kindergrubber saves her from further confusion by following after with an odd bottle she found left among the ingredients: reverserum. Draculaura immediately understands what must've happened and Kindergrubber explains that the reverserum reversed the emotions of those who ate the cookies, meaning that anyone excited about their role now has stage fright. Draculaura finally realizes she took on too much and should've accepted help. Fortunately, Kindergrubber does like the flavor the reverserum added and grades it favorably. Relieved, Draculaura encourages everyone to further ruin the decor: instead of a normie soap opera, she'll rewrite the script to be a monster movie. ;Lost and Sound Frankie is zapping everyone left and right again because one of her bolts is missing and her circuit going haywire. Abbey spots it stuck in her belt and notes to a grateful Frankie that she's always been good at finding things. Frankie suggests she starts a Lost-and-Found board for the Gory Gazette and Abbey gladly takes the job. The board is received well enough and Abbey can immediately try to find some missing items, but during administration Shiver runs off. Abbey follows him into the catacombs, where she finds Holt has set up a DJ table to practice his tunes. Holt explains the catacombs have the perfect acoustics and that there's only one thing that makes the place less than the perfect hangout for him. Just then, Operetta approaches them while singing a song. Holt tells Abbey to cover her ears or else she'll be loopy for days, but Operetta stops soon enough. Holt and Operetta get into an argument as to who has a right to use the catacombs, resulting in Operetta chasing the others out by singing. Defeated, Holt asks Abbey to find him another place to practice. As per her Lost-and-Found, she finds him a cave elsewhere to practice, but even though it suits Holt just fine, somehow his sound isn't what he'd like it to be anymore. Returning to the school building, Abbey has to stop Shiver from running off to the catacombs again. In doing so, she overhears Operetta working on her new song, and she seems to have similar problems as Holt has. This gives Abbey an idea; normally she only finds upon request, but there's no reason for her not to take the initiative. She secretly records both Operetta's and Holt's music, mixes the two together, and invites both students to the same classroom. There, she makes them listen to the mix and the two are surprised they sound this good together. They agree to stop competing for space and join forces to create a dance mix, which on Abbey's suggestion they'll play at the Gory Gazette party later that week. ;These Boots Were Made for Rolling The new season is off to a terrible start for the Monster High SKRM team, also known as the Nightmares. Firstly, Robecca's trusty right steamboot breaks down during training, forcing her to the bench for the rest of the session. Secondly, the Nightmares find their equipment to be lacking. Their rollerskates are old, while there's a new design on the market that makes even zombies opponents to fear. The Nightmares decide to end the session early and blame it on a bad day, certain that their upcoming practice with the vampires will prove this to be just a bad day. As they leave, Robecca is approached by Frankie with a request to write a pre-SKRM season article for the Gory Gazette to get everyone in the mood. Robecca prepares a piece about how the Nightmares left the Vampires eating dust during practice, but she has to throw her work away when the actual day arrives. The Vampires have the new rollerskates too and pose the same challenge as the zombies. Taking this as definite proof they need new gear, the Nightmares organize a bake sale to raise money for the new equipment. Robecca does not want new rollerskates though, because she is attached to her steamboots. She fixes it to the best of her abilities, which isn't much considering one component needs to be replaced altogether, but it's rare and therefor expensive. The rest of the team respects her choice and promises to help her out as well as they can. However, the next practice session, against the gargoyles of Granite City High, ends up as the worst of the three by far. Robecca's steamboot breaks down again and she crashes into Rochelle and Heath, ending the practice session for the Nightmares. Rochelle and Heath help her off the track, but Robecca is devastated and quits the team. Unwilling to play without her, the team finds a replacement for Robecca's broken component on Zbay and bring their new rollerskates back to the store to get the money to buy the component. Needless to say, Robecca is elated. During the next match, coincidentally again against the Gargoyles, the Nightmares focus on teamplay instead of on speed. While the new rollerskates of the Gargoyles fall apart, the Nightmares roll to victory. Robecca can finally write her article for the Gory Gazette. ;Scream All About It! The latest issue of the Gory Gazette is almost ready to be uploaded. All that is missing yet is Ghoulia's Dead Fast review. Headless Headmistress Bloodgood compliments Frankie on a job well done and shares that she thinks the editor-in-chief will make her a permanent part of the Gory Gazette staff. Happy, Frankie prepares for the party hosted by Cleo that evening and leaves Ghoulia to finish up and put the new version of the newspaper online. Ghoulia soon loses herself in a daydream of sketches about Dead Fast and her OC Ms. Dead Fast saving the editor-in-chief and finding out their true identity. In the daydream, Dr. Igorable has taken the editor-in-chief prisoner and tries to convince them to end their freaky newspaper that spreads understanding among scary monsters. Dead Fast and Ms. Dead Fast save them by presenting Dr. Igorable and his henchmen with a shiny mini-discoball that has them dancing in no-time. But just as the superfast duo is to learn the identity of the editor-in-chief, Bloodgood disturbs the daydream by asking if the new edition is online yet. Ghoulia uploads it quickly while Bloodgood takes a peek at her Dead Fast sketches. She compliments Ghoulia for it and suggests that Ghoulia asks the editor-in-chief to print one. Ghoulia hazards a guess and asks if it's Bloodgood she should be asking. Bloodgood just smiles and informs her they should make their way to the party. At the party, all those writing for the Gory Gazette are hanging out and congratulating Frankie for her work as managing editor. As Bloodgood arrives to give her speech, Frankie just hopes it was good enough to earn her a permanent position. Her worries are soon dealt with, because Bloodgood has nothing but praise for her efforts and announces she is to stay. Frankie is asked to finish the speech and reveal the new issue herself. An overburdened eletric network almost ruins the premiere, but it is nothing Frankie can't fix. The reveal is met with loud cheering. Characters ;Hissy Fit ;Hot Couture ;Stage Fright ;Lost and Sound ;These Boots Were Made for Rolling ;Scream All About It! Notes References * "These Boots Were Made for Rolling" is a play on the 1966 song "These Boots Are Made for Walkin'". * "I feel I must shake, shake, shake my booty?!" is a reference to the 1976 song "(Shake, Shake, Shake) Shake Your Booty" Continuity * Holt notes that Operetta's singing voice makes him loopy. The two confirmed powers she has access to are a (destructive) scream and mind-control. Making people "loopy" is not a power her singing voice is shown to have anywhere else, though it fits the context of "My voice kinda does stuff to people," said in "Here Comes Treble" better than the other two powers. * Lagoona being a friend of the frogs goes back to her Classroom doll and the associated Volume 1 webisode "Freedom Fight". * All the SKRM teams in "These Boots Were Made for Rolling" previously appeared in the TV special "Friday Night Frights". The Nightmares are composed of the members who were given a roll call at the end of the TV special. Milestones * 40 characters make their comic debuts, as do the frogs. * Create-A-Monster's female insect, female three-eyed ghoul, female blob, female ghost, and female mummy all make appearances. * The school nurse makes her fiction debut. Errors * According to her 'School's Out' diary, Cleo has an innate ability to charm snakes and explicitly rejects the use of flutes for that, yet in "Hissy Fit" she has to resort to using one. * Frankie's non-petrified hand in "Hissy Fit" switches between being a right hand or a left hand. * Romulus and Simon are miscolored in "Hot Couture", both sporting yellow skin instead of their respective pink and grey. * In "Lost and Sound", Shiver's head-fur is not colored white when Operetta makes her entrance. * Iris is miscolored in "Scream All About It!", sporting blue skin and red hair instead of shades of green. Other * In the catalogue of Little, Brown and Company, the series is announced with a small version of a textless comic page. This page is not included in the comic nor is there a story that could've logically included the scene due to the peculiar presence of Toralei Stripe that would need some context. "Hot Couture" does have a minimal fearleading scene though. * The announcement also promised seven stories instead of six. It is possible the "Behind the Screams" section was counted, but it is also possible a story was scrapped or even transferred to I Only Have Eye for You. * The following fashions are worn in "Scream All About It!": Frankie and Deuce wear their Dawn of the Dance outfits, Cleo wears her Scaris: City of Frights dress, Clawdeen, Lagoona, and Ghoulia wear their Ghoul's Night Out clothes, Abbey and Spectra wear their 'To Howl For' fashions, Robecca wears her 'My Wardrobe and I' dress, and Draculaura wears her Music Festival ensemble. Category:Comics